


The Way to Camelot

by TheStrawberryPunk



Category: Arthurian Mythology, Original Work
Genre: Camelot, Monsters, Multi, Other, i guess, time travel??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-25
Updated: 2019-02-25
Packaged: 2019-10-31 07:26:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,636
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17845007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheStrawberryPunk/pseuds/TheStrawberryPunk
Summary: She was always fascinated by fairy tales, she loved reading them as much as others loved math, or video games, or whatever! But what happens when she finds herself in one? And was that King Arthur?





	The Way to Camelot

Green whipped past her, each leaf or tree quickly becoming a blur of green, hints of brown joining the quick blur of colors, the path in front of her a light brown, the treetops become a green or a brown or a red, the bushes becoming blurs of green with blue or pink or red flower-blurs added in. She didn’t know how fast she was going but it must’ve been fast. The water in her eyes combined with the speed made everything turn into a blur. The trees the bushes, the flowers, - everything! It really was a rainbow of blurs, with reds and oranges and pinks and blues and greens, it truly was an amazing sight.

She laughed, a giddy noise escaping her mouth. It felt soft and heard carefree. She supposed that the sound of laughter was a sound that she associated with the feeling of joy, it was always something that when she heard, it carried happiness and delight. This time was no different, the sound of laughter carried joy, just like always. The sound of laughter wasn’t uncommon to be found out of her mouth; it appearing after a good ride, or winning a fencing match or having fun with her friends. If you caught the sound of giddy laughter coming out of her, or any laughter really, it would be something that you could be certain to find her doing the same activity that brought the laughter out of her in the first place. She liked the sound of laughter and joy, it was with her at all times. She desired to hear the sound of laughter, so she often participated in activities that brought out that laughter.

Then, before she let her thoughts get too far away from her - she didn’t want that to happen, she needed to pay attention to the path that she was following - she gathered up her thoughts and watched them board the train to pay-attention-to-the-path-land. She tearfully waved them goodbye and, just as the train arrived at pay-attention-to-the-path-land, returned her focus to the path. Not wanting to crash into a tree or anything. That would a predicament that she didn’t want to get into. Imagine all the twigs and leaves stuck in her hair. Blugh. She didn’t want to be the one to have to clean the mess that could be made from that.

Her eyes hit the path she was following- well it was more a trail. Her eyes hit the trail she was following and she knew that she must be at least three-quarters of the way done with the trail, but she didn’t want to pass go and collect 200 dollars. She wanted to keep at the speed she was going, it was nice and fast and it gave her the adrenaline boost that she so desperately needed. But, she knew that she was going to have to turn around and ride back, she always thought that the way there was always more fun than the way back. Plus, she would have to go at a different speed; that was not something that she so desired on that fine evening.

But, she braced herself for the end that she knew was going to come, not because she wanted the ride to end but because this happens usually when she was going on a ride: she not wanting it to end, it does end, she gets disappointed. This was not going to happen on this ride - okay let's be honest, it probably will - she’s going to prepare herself for when she gets disappointed at the end of the ride. Or was it the middle of the ride? Because she would still have to turn back and run back out of the forest, so she was just almost halfway done with the ride. Okay, so she’ll prepare herself for the middle of the ride - when she’ll turn back.

Now that that was settled, she turned her thoughts back to their original purpose, the pat- Or, you know what? She feels like she had done that already. Maybe it would be better to just let her thoughts run its course while she focuses’ a small part of her attention at the path, then she should just let the rest of her thoughts run their course. She decided that yes, that was an idea she could get behind. Or vote for. Though she is underage… she would still vote for it.

She wondered why people would call their thoughts about different things. Like some people would call their thoughts ‘Dreamland’ - though the whole expression would be getting lost in Dreamland - others would call their thoughts all sorts of things, she in particular (well, her friends, but no one would have to know that) called her thoughts ‘Fantasyland.’ Somewhere she visited so frequently, that she even had a season’s pass to the place. It was somewhere that she will admit she liked to visit, having many fun memories she gained from the location. One of her favorite ways to visit Fantasyland was indulging herself in a good book - a fantasy book. Or, if you wanted to get really specific, a fairytale.

She would never admit it to herself but she might have a small obsession with fairytales, as the books being the only kind that was sat upon her bookshelf. She might be the type to never turn down a good ol’ knight-or-some-other-hero-saves-a-princess-from-a-dragon, story especially the type that ends with a good old love story, which she will admit, she does enjoy those tales. She was always the one who convinced her friends to play any kind of princess game, most likely including a knight and a kiss at the end. Whether it be a cheek kiss or forehead kiss, it would be the one to turn the frog back into the princess. While her friends might’ve grown out of their princess phases she most certainly has not. She can tell you that while the girl next door is more interested in playing video games or cooking or whatever, you could most certainly find her and the corner of her couch reading a fairytale. Sometimes you could spot her with all kinds of different fairy tales, from Snow White to Hansel and Gretel you could always find her there, reading a fairy tale. If you would look though, the odds would be in your favor if you wanted to catch her reading any one of the “King Arthur” legends - and yes, she knows that they aren’t exactly fairy tales, she still counts them, they were her favorite fairy tales of course.

The idea that someone would look inside her house, just to see which fairy tale she was reading was not something she wanted to happen - it was just plain creepy. Though it was true, you could probably find her reading the King Arthur fairy tales if you looked through the window, it was still creepy. But because of this fact she would say that would say that maybe she had an obsession with fairy tales, though she it was normal to have an obsession, right? There are people who are obsessed with video games! If they could have video games then she could have her fairy tales!

While she was pondering her status as someone who was obsessed with fairy tales, a small brown blur hopped into her vision and onto the path that she was following, -wait. Hopped? OH! I’ll have to stop Marigold! As she quickly stopped her horse she breathed a sigh of relief that the bunny was still a bit far away from the location that she stopped at. She was not crushing that bunny (or any animal in particular) today! Well, she wouldn’t have crushed the bunny, he was already halfway across the path by the time she stopped, and she couldn’t see it anymore, so it probably wouldn’t have been crushed. Well… it’s the thought that counts?

She sighed, it sounded disappointed. Ok, she was proud of herself for not running over the rabbit, plus she was actually paying attention to the path and stopped herself from running over the rabbit. Oh, who was she kidding, the rabbit would’ve probably saved itself it, she didn’t stop. But, at least it stopped on the chance that she could’ve let Marigold step on it.

She urged the horse along the path, ready to stop again at any time if it was needed, it probably wasn’t, but just in case. She brought the horse up to a trot, a major difference to the speed she was riding before. A few feet after she brought the horse to a trot she saw the end of the trail, the end marked with a bright orange sign that she could definitely say was something that is an eyesore. You see all these beautiful greens, and reds, and blues, and then -BAM. Neon Orange. She quickly tore her eyes away from the sign and stopped Marigold from trotting any further as she was only 6 or so feet away from the ‘Trail Ends’ sign. She turned the horse around and started to go at a pace that wasn’t any faster than the pace at the beginning of the ride through the forest, but was faster than a trot, she still wanted to go fast, but she didn’t want to run over anything, like a frog, or something.

As Marigold thrust forward, she found herself letting her thoughts run wild, but still paying attention to the path. She wanted to watch out for that frog. As she let her thoughts wander, she found them to be going in all different directions. Some revisiting topics that she liked to revisit all the time, some being: How much homework did she have left? Why was the government so disliked? And why couldn’t people care less about fairy tales? She was sure that there were answers for all of the above, but it wasn't a multiple choice answer, she didn’t have the time or that o the only question out of the three that was regularly answered was that if she had any homework. That was a question that she needed to be answered on a day to day basis.

Another question that she wanted to answer that she only thought up recently, was the questions: were fairy tales based off of real-life events? If so, why did so many fairy tales include magic, because magic wasn’t real, so what was the magic really? Like if someone used a potion in a fairy tale, would the potion just include a fungus that causes people to be crazy, get sick etc. She figured that there was some fact in fairy tales, after all, some fairy tales almost seem too good to be something that someone thought up. Like take Hercules’ 12 Trials of Labor, for example, one of the trials, moving a log so that water from a river could clean a stable, seems reasonable, but getting the guard dog of the underworld up to the surface and showing the guard dog to your cousin seems unreasonable, or possible. But cleaning out a stable with water from a river seemed like something that she could do. But, she wasn't a fairy tale expert just yet, she was only in high school.

Absentmindedly she stopped her horse, and pet his neck, expecting the horse to whinny a whine, so she pets the next of the great beast. Calming the horse down, even if the horse was calm already. Once she deemed the horse calm enough, she settled the horse down and slid off of Marigold. Once she found herself on the ground and off of Marigold she turned back to the horse and rummaged through the bag that was attached to the horse. After around a minute of rummaging through Marigolds bag, she found what she was looking for, some rope. After she pulled the rope out of the bag that Marigold was carrying with her, for emergencies, she unraveled the rope and tied one end to Marigold, walking the other end to a tree that was nearby, pulling Marigold with her. Once she reached a tree she tied the end of the rope that wasn't tied to Marigold to a branch that was on the tree that she had walked towards. Once Marigold was tied to a tree and the tree was tied to Marigold, she stepped back and examined the rope.

Once she was done looking over Marigold and the tree, perhaps examining the rope to make sure that that Marigold couldn't pull the rope free and escape, she turned on her heal and walked towards the trees. She reached the trees and, still lost in her thoughts, pushed through branches and vines and moved towards a path that seemed to have its entrance covered by branches and the floor covered in fallen branches and fallen trees. The moss and mushrooms growing everywhere. Even when she was lost in her thoughts she still could hear the sound of twigs breaking as she stepped on them. The sound not breaking her out of her trance but making her blink rapidly every time that she did step on them. As she walked across the 5 maybe 6 feet path she seemed to have a look of determination on her face, that she lost as soon as she crossed the whole path and was snapped out of the trance. As soon as the face of determination left her face, the face of confusion appeared on it.

She started to wonder why she wasn't on Marigold's back and why she was in the trees, seeming to stand at the end of some path, she saw what the path led to. The path that she found was overgrown, with moss and mushrooms everywhere, led to what had to be one of the most beautiful groves she had ever seen.

With trees lining the whole place that didn't even seem to be real. Seriously, what kind of tree had such enchanting purple leaves! And the waterfall that resided almost 20 feet away from the entrance, with crystal clear waters, and otherworldly orange fish in the pond. The cave was carved from the stone, it was somehow big and small at the same time, with vines framing the whole cave, it was truly a mystical experience. With the bright blue water and the oranges fish and the royal purple leaves, she almost suspected that she had stepped into a fairy tale. But, looking behind her at the path that she took (she could still see Marigold), she could still tell that she wasn't. This was disappointing, as the whole grove that seemed to be unbelievably unreal, she almost would risk never seeing her family again just to stay here forever, but she couldn't do that. She had to be there for her family when no one else was, with her Grandma dying and all that, Mom was a wreck and she couldn't risk her being even more saddened by the loss of his only child. So she, while resigned, didn't stay there for the rest of her life, she just wanted to explore a bit. After all, when did a little exploring hurt anyone?

As she pushed all of those sad thoughts out of her mind, she looked over the whole grove, it was a small hidden corner of the forest and it seemed to be completely untouched, as if she was the only one who had ever seen the little open grove, this fact only excited her more, as those purple trees could be the only ones in the world and she could've discovered them herself! This was pretty exciting but she wanted to do some research before she made any assumptions, she didn't want to get ahead of herself just yet.  
After all those thoughts were gone she treated the soft grass carefully, not wanted to describe the garden as a whole, it seemed to quiet; to peaceful to start shouting and screaming, the only sounds in the small open grove being the waterfall, that peaceful water hitting water sound that was very relaxing, and the small sound of her riding boots on the small almost lime green grass. If she listened hard enough she could hear the occasion ribbit of a frog or the plop of a bunny hopping, but, as she was more fascinated by the surroundings then the small subtleties in the grove, she missed those small fascinating noises of a forest creek.

With another survey of the whole land, she found that the cave was very fairy tale-esct. She could picture a dragon with long red wings and an angry face living in that very cave, with its mounds of gold and it's fire wielding breath. She knew that dragons weren't real and that there was no possible way that any kind of dragon could live in this cave, she couldn't help but wish that those two facts were wrong and that there was a dragon that lived in that very cave, she knew that it couldn't be real. She didn't want to pay the small price of getting her hopes up for the crushing debt of finding out that there was no reason to get her hopes up. It wasn't a fair trade.

Standing in the middle of the grove she couldn't help but wonder why she has never seen this before, with all the times the Marigold and she had ridden down this path it was a miracle that she had never seen this before. Even if the grove was hidden by 5 feet or so of trees it seemed phenomenal that she at least hasn't seen the indent of the tree path in the forest or the waterfall, the sound of water hitting water, it wasn't something that she would just... miss. It seemed like this whole grove was shrouded mystery. First, the grove seems like no one else had ever seen it before, it had also was trees with purple leaves. The grove also had crystal clear waters, that was not something that she had seen in West Virginia before. Plus the whole cave situation, with the cave looking like it should house a dragon and the cave looking like it was big and small.

With one more glance around the whole place, she really wondered if this place was part of a fairy tale, she walked towards the cave. She didn't want to slip in any mud, because although she hadn't seen any mud in the grove the admittedly multiple times she had surveyed the grove, she was appearing the waterfall and she didn't want anything on her shoes - mud notwithstanding. As the cave drew nearer and nearer she wondered if she really would encounter a dragon hiding within the cave. It was a hopeful thought, one that she did consider one last time before she finally reached the cave. As she reached the cave, not a long walk from the center of the grove but it felt like forever, she felt intimidated by the sheer size of the cave. It truly was big. If you stacked two of her on top of each other, they might be able to reach the top - mind you, she was five feet, five inches. She wondered how the cave could've been able to look so small at the end of the path when now - now that she was closer - she could really see it's size. She also wondered how in the world a cave found its way into the forest. There was no mountain in this forest - especially where she was standing right now - so how could almost 10 feet tall cave find its way into the forest? But, just as she was pondering that very thought, she found that it got chased out of her mind and that she had no memory of the question at all. So, she went on, amazed by the size of the cave, without any memory of the situation at hand.

She was very much in awe of how big and tall the cave was when she decided to come into the cave, and explore. She wanted to find that dragon for herself, and maybe just maybe she wanted to pet the dragon as well, but we won't mention that to anyone. As she walked to the entrance of the cave, she found herself looking up. When she looked up she found vines. Not just any old vines though - she found vines that she would normally find in the forest, but sized up. It seemed like nature decided that if there's going to be such a big cave - there's got big accessories for the cave. So ginormous vines it is!

As much as she wanted to praise the cave and its vines, she knew that she didn't have all the time in the world and that Marigold was waiting for her. Plus she didn't want to strain her neck by looking up for so long - that would start to ache and hurt and that wasn't something that she wanted to happen. So, with great reluctantly she pulled her head from the great vines and the tall, seemingly never-ending cave, and pushed her head forwards. The look of determination that was on her face when she first faced the grove had appeared again, and she was determined to let it stay and have some tea. Maybe have a nice little ol' chat about the weather while she's at it. With determination on her face and a pounding in her ears, she stepped forwards, ready to face whatever thrown at her.

With her face drawn in determination and her ears starting to go deaf from all that pounding, she walked into the cave. She tried to enter the cave all heroic like, but she just made a fool of herself. Shaking her head trying to get used to the darkness, and when that didn't work blinking rapidly. She made such a fool of herself, that she was almost grateful that when her eyes finally adjusted to the darkness she saw nothing. Nothing. Nothing at all. She almost sighed, she was very disappointed, when a shining light caught her eye. It seemed almost cliche, with her entering a cave, looking around, seeing nothing, then seeing something- yeah it was very cliche. But she didn't mind it being cliche, she didn't mind the fact that there was no dragon. She didn't even mind that she made a total fool of herself earlier. What she did mind however was how cool the thing that caught her eye was.

It was a carving in the surprisingly bleak inside of the cave. The carving was not something that you could find at first glance, it made her wonder how she even found it. With the cave being as bland as it is and the craving being the same color as the cave walls, there was no difference. And the carving is very subtle, she wondered how in the first place she even saw the carving. She remembered a shining light. But there was no way that a shining light could've been made from that carving- it looked old. Centuries old. And from how old it looked- electricity hasn't been made yet. So it was quite the mystery of how the light (or what exactly was) was made.

She walked over to the carving in the wall, wonder what it was and how in the world a light could've come out of it. Maybe there was a hole in the wall of the that doubled as a hole to the outside? So sunlight could come in? That seemed like a plausible solution but, how would the light be a bright as it was though? It was a pretty bright light - so even if the carving had such a hole, then it would be a pretty long hole. And the back of the hole would be into the forest, so how would light come through that long small passage, staying as bright as it is, even when it full light beam probably couldn't even get to the hole on the other side of the carving because the light beam would've been obscured by the trees and the branches and everything in between!

She stopped pondering the schematics of a light beam coming through the cave wall - she knew it wasn't impossible, the Ancient Egyptians did it after all- she just didn't have the time. She knew she was on a time crunch, but she seemed to keep forgetting it. With this new (well, not really new) information in mind she began to walk toward the carving, she was still a couple feet away from the carving after all. As she got closer and closer to the carving she couldn't seem to find what caused that great light that attracted her to the carving. All she could see - in the minimum light mind you - was some guys on horses and a monster. The guys on horses she was quickly disinterested by, they were just your normal knights, metal armor, horses, swords. What she was interested in was the monster that was next to the knights. This monster was the worst of them all. It had the whole shabang. The spikes, the tails, the four eyes, the six arms, all in all, it was awesome! This was something that she would look forward to meeting. Not some silly knights, the monsters! The pizazz! The outstanding fashion, this was what she looked forward too! Not some knights, here to save the day, slay the dragon. It's the dragon itself that caught her interest.

With a new goal in mind to find out just exactly what this monster, if it even is a monster it looks more like a dragon, is. Or is supposed to be. She glances over the craving in the cave wall once more; before she turns on her heal and walks away from the cave. And way from the carving. She reaches the entrance, or rather the exit, of the cave and glances around her little grove in the side of the forest trail. Her little waterfall, her purple trees, and her giant vines that reside above her head.

After she's done surveying her surroundings, she looks toward the path she came and with a new found determination she walks across the field, across her grove, and into the overgrown path. The path is easy to traverse, it's short, it's plain, and most importantly, it's clear. Once the small path has been crossed she can see Marigold, not hurt or anything. That's a relief. Grazing the grass under him. Any doubt that Marigold is okay is ushered off as she starts towards the tree that she tied Marigold to and starts to undo the knot tied there. Once she finishes tying that know she heads Marigold, or more specifically where the rope is tied on Marigold and undoes it. Once the two knots are untied and the rope is put back into the bag, she climbs onto Marigold, ready to start riding again.

She makes sure that Marigold is facing the trail, not the trees (she made sure that she was going the right way) she urges Marigold forward. She makes sure that Marigold is going at a steady pace and starts to zone out. She wants to figure out what exactly was that grove and how come it looked like she was the only one who has ever seen it. While she is getting lost in her thoughts, Marigold traverse the trail with practiced ease, something that they have done so many times that it seems natural.

With her getting lost in her thoughts trying to figure out why she was to one to find the grove and how did she even get to the grove. She just remembers riding along, then seeing the beautiful, beautiful field. She figures that she can't solve a mystery she doesn't have the memories for and she decides to not pay any attention to it. Though she won't forget about it, that is too big of something to forget. With all this going on in her mind it's not a surprise when she reaches the end of the trail, the part of the forest that connects to the field right next to it.

She wasn't sure how long it took to ride the path with Marigold this time, it seems too long to count, but she knew that she left at noon, she had just had lunch. And if the sun is still in the sky, it means that... it's not night time? She doesn't know the exact time but she does know that she's going to be home before curfew. So that was good.

It was only then that she realized that Marigold hasn't moved since she got out of the trail and she tried to make Marigold move, only to realize that she was staying put. This confused her as Marigold never had any problems if this before, she knew the route and she knew that nothing scared her on it. So she was put into quite a predicament Marigold won't move and her house was in sight. She sighed as her brain got to work on how to figure it out. This was not a normal Marigold freeze, she just stopped moving altogether, which was weird. Marigold didn’t ‘just stop.’ Ever. So this is certainly a strange occurrence.

It was only then that she glanced around and took note of her surroundings that she noticed she was in a field. Now, this wasn’t odd as she rode through fields all the time, but she didn’t ride through fields where people went missing in. She forgot about this. The fact that the field was right behind her house didn’t help. She wondered why her parents didn’t simply just sell the house. She figured that it must be too much of a hassle to move, but that wasn’t a good reason in her eyes, as the field had people go missing every other month. It was a mystery about how she didn’t get kidnapped. Or how she didn’t go missing.

She sighed and started to stroke her fingers through Marigold’s long soft hair. It was tangle-free as always. Well, that may be due to the fact that she brushed it every week, along and pain-staking process that she was sure was completely unnecessary. Other people simply braided their horse’s hair but she went through this whole process, and she was sure that it was just routine at this point. This whole time she had run her fingers through Marigold’s mane as a way to ground herself, but it seemed like it calmed down Marigold as well. She was surprised that she calmed down Marigold, her running her fingers through Marigold's mane as a way to calm herself was something that she did a lot, she never knew that Marigold calmed down from the stroking as well.

This was good that Marigold calmed down from the stroking because sooner or later she was going to have to find a way to calm the horse down, because if she couldn’t find a way to calm him down, then she would be stuck on him ‘til her parents arrived. Which could take hours, and that was not something that she would have the most fun doing, waiting until her parents came to her.

Then without prompting Marigold began to jog across the field. She yelped and adjusted herself so she would be more comfortable on the horse. She let Marigold set the pace that she wanted to and relaxed on the horse, ready to let Marigold take the familiar path and guide them to home. Marigold took a confident, if fast-paced, stride all the way home. She let out a breath that she didn’t know she was holding as she spotted her house. She patted Marigold’s neck in congratulations on a ride well done. She wondered if Marigold read her mind and figured out that she was panicked by the field and helped her get away from it. She thanked the horse as the house became clearer and clearer at the horizon line. Soon becoming a solid object that she could tell the distinct soft blue of the house, with its white pillars and green flower bushes. The flowers not being green of course, the prized carnations being a bright purple that she had always admired.

As Marigold started to jog down a path that let to their stables she tried to remember she had any homework left to do. In the end, she concluded that, no, she didn’t have any more homework to do. She remembered that her Mom had lectured her on this fact before she left. That was a very long and rather meaningless conversation. The whole ordeal boiling down to: “Make sure that you do your homework before you leave to go riding!” The reason that she thought the whole conversation was meaningless was the fact that she did any homework when she got home, way before the whole lecture had started. So she had just sat there and endured the long discussion, only for her to interrupt her Mom at the end telling her that she already did.

During her whole triad, she never noticed that Marigold had arrived at the stables and had stopped in front of the horse supply shed, only noticing when the horse had gotten his face into hers, engaging in a staring contest. In the end, she won, but she suspected that she had only won because the horse didn’t know the rules of the game. After the two were done, she swung her leg around Marigold’s behind and once her two legs were on the same side of the horse, slid off.

After she had dismounted Marigold she took to taking the riding gear off of Marigold and putting it in the shed. The saddle, the reins, the bridle, everything. Well, except for her horseshoes. Those were nailed into his feet, she didn’t think that she could get those off if she tried. Once Marigold was bare of all the riding equipment she led the horse off to her stall. It wasn’t a far walk to get to Marigold’s stall, but it was always a hassle to get a horse to follow you without reins or anything. But, she amended, the stall was so close to the shed that it would be a waste of time to keep the reins on, as she still had to do many things. Such as: lead the horse to the stall, get him in the stall, take off the reins, then put the reins away.

As she was leading Marigold into her stall she noticed something weird inside of Marigold’s stall. This confused her as the only thing that should be in Marigold’s stall would be hay, dirt, and Marigold. When she got closer to the stall she noticed that the thing that was in Marigold’s stall was golden. And she had seen it admit the same light beam that caught her eye in the cave. She quickly made sure that Marigold standing still in a spot before hurrying over to the stall to see what exactly that thing was. If it made the same light that she saw in the cave did that mean that it was something to do with the carving? As she got closer and closer to the… the shiny thing, she began to make out the shape of this shiny thing she noticed that it was quickly taking the form of a key. She got inside of Marigold’s stall and walked to the back of the stall. Once reaching the end she bent down, picked up the key and immediately felt a shudder through her body.

As the key lightly shined in her hand she definitely knew that it held some connection to the carving in the wall. She didn’t know how she knew that, but it was something that she was sure of. She knew that this fact was as true as the fact that Ted Cruz was the Zodiac Killer. Okay- she’ll admit it. That was a bad comparison. She knew that this fact was true as much as she knew that Fairy Tales are her favorite books. Now THAT was a better comparison. She knew that she would always love fairy tales. So she knew that the key was somehow related to the carving in the wall in the cave of that fascinating hidden grove.

Just then as she was pondering the way that the key could be related to the carving, Marigold whinnied, drawing her attention and snapping her out of her thoughts all at once. She sighed, pocketed the key for further examination and paid attention to the horse who was looking very bored at the moment. She let herself out of the stall and walked herself to Marigold, ready to lead the horse into the stall, and lead him she did.

Once she knew that Marigold was inside her stall, safe and sound, she pulled herself away from the horse, unwilling to leave as she had spent the whole evening with him. Well, most of the evening. The cave incident left Marigold alone for quite some time, but, she didn’t count that. But with the will of a hundred men, she left the stalls where her mother’s horse, Rosebud, resided. The stalls were also where her father’s horse, Daffodil, lived. Horse Riding, she supposed, was something that ran in the family, everyone whom she had met - in the family - had ridden on a horse, so she supposed that it was some kind of family tradition. She knew that while horse riding was a supposed family tradition, fencing was not. Though it was something that she enjoyed doing just as much as she enjoyed horse riding. Which did remind her, she had to practice some footing and stances. She was a bit bummed out at this because as much as she did enjoy fencing, she didn't enjoy the practicing or the footing, anything of that sort. She liked the action not the proper way to do it. Though, she supposed, that maybe it did help a bit. The techniques helped her not sprain her ankle, something that had happened many times fencing. She will admit it, she is a bit of a clutz, it always a mystery on how she had managed to sprain her ankle while fencing, something that mostly used your hands. But, she didn't worry too much about it, as her instructor, Amelia, said that it was perfectly normal and not to worry about it much. ¨Just don´t walk on a sprained ankle!¨ was the only thing that she had ever heard from Amelia when she asked if she should worry. She knew it was good advice, and she did stay off her ankle but she always thought that Amelia could give her more advice, but, nevertheless, she digressed.

As she walked closer and closer to the backdoor, the one she always entered by when she came back from a ride she heard her dad calling her through a window. “Sweetheart, Is that you?”

She opened the backdoor, came inside the house and responded with, “Yeah, I’m done with my ride, how’s dinner going?”

“Dinner’s good, dinner’s good.” He responded putting a pan of what looked to be lasagna into the oven, closing it with a slam. “How was the ride today, Marigold’s behaving right?”

She looked at him weirdly, she had never mentioned Marigold having any behavior problems, so it was an open case on why her dad asked that question. But, she let it go. “Yeah, the ride was nice, but I was going to fast to really appreciate the ride.”

Her dad chuckled, understanding that she always found a way to make it a competition, even when she was the only one participating. “I don’t doubt that sweetheart. I know that you must’ve had a fun ride when you’re bouncing like that.”

She looked down at her feet, and sure enough, they were bouncing. No doubt excited by the secret grove that she had found, making her look like she was full of energy, even as late as it was. She flushed, embarrassed by the fact that she was bouncing. And that it was so noticeable that her Dad could see and point it out to herself. She could see her Dad chuckling at the embarrassment that she so clearly showed, when she saw her Mom in the doorway, a small tired smile on her face as she watched her family.

She walked over to her Mom, (well, it was more a bounce, as she was still bouncing) and hugged her, surprising her so much that it took a few seconds before she responded, bringing her arms around her to participate in the hug. She felt all warm and fuzzy inside, happy that her Mom was happy. It sounded like the most cheesy thing, but it was true.  
After a minute or two of just solid hugging, her Dad said, “Am I going to have to separate you two? It seems like you're both comfortable though so I wouldn’t budge.”

Her Mom, no doubt embarrassed from being caught hugging for so long, slowly pulled away, kissing her head as she pulled back. “Anne, sweetie, could you set the table please?” She nodded, moving to fetch plates and silverware.

Her parents watched her as she moved around the room, grabbing the supplies and setting them on their proper places on the table. “She seems to be happy tonight.” Her mother told her dad as she grabbed three glasses, setting the glasses above the knives.

Her father made a sound that could’ve been a noise of agreement but it was hard to tell as he had walked up behind her mom and hugged, his face buried in his wife’s hair.  
Once Anne was finished setting the table, she walked over her parents - most of her excitement was gone, so she didn’t bounce, or anything like that. And kissed their cheeks before walking out of the room, a new goal in mind - check the books to see if she could find any mention of a six-armed four-eyed being. She wasn’t going to call it a monster, that would be too cruel.

As she bounded up the stairs, on the way to her room Anne could hear the remaining chuckles of her two parents. Once she entered her room she flopped onto her bed - ready to relax, when she remembered the goal that she had in mind. Find out what that being was. Actually, Anne could settle for seeing if any fairy tale in her collection mentioned anything like that being.

As she started to pull out fairy tales from her bookshelf she remembered the strange key that she had found in Marigold’s stall, and started to pull out tales that she remembered held golden keys that shine. Now as those were both incredibly small categories she didn’t expect to own that many fairy tales that held a six-armed, four-eyed being. Or fairy tales that held shiny golden keys. And she was right; as far as she knew she didn’t own that many fairy tales that had those two things, but she was going off of memory so it wouldn’t be the most accurate research. So she vowed that once she was done looking through all the tales that she thought held relevance, she would read the ones that probably didn’t hold any relation if she couldn’t find any mention of them, but it was a good start.

Anne started to sort the fairy tales that she had pulled off the shelves into two different piles. Pile one consisting of all the fairy tales that she thought held any mention to a six-armed four-eyed thing. And pile two holding all the fairy tales that she thought had any mention of a golden key. As expected pile two was a lot bigger than pile one. This wasn’t surprising as Anne didn’t think that many fairy tales held mention to a six-armed four-eyed being. A being in which she was really needed to name. “Six armed four-eyed being” really was a long name.

As Anne was pondering what exactly the name for this being could be, Anne heard her door open. As she looked up to the door Anne saw her dad standing in the doorway of her room, looking confused

“Dad, what’s wrong?” Anne asked, concerned from the look on her father’s face.

“What? Why would you think that something's wrong?” Her dad inquired, confused about why she thought something was wrong.

“You just have this confused expression on your face, I was wondering what was wrong.”

“Ah that,” Anne’s dad relaxed as she realized what she was talking about. “I was wondering what you were doing. What are you doing anyway?”

“Oh yeah, that. I was just looking for something.”

“In your fairy tales?”

“Yeah!

“What were you looking for in your fairy tales then?”

“A golden key!”

“Ah yes, a golden key. Now, why exactly were you looking for a golden key then sweetheart?”  
“I wanted to find out what it was.”

“So, let me get this straight, you wanted to find out about a golden key, so you put some of your fairy tales into two piles, and stared off into the distance?”  
She flushed, embarrassed by the fact that her logic wasn’t sound. And tried to justify her actions by saying, “Uh… Yes?”

Anne’s Dad chuckled, and said, “Well have fun with that honey, I’m just here to let you know that dinner is ready. You might want to eat, but I’m not sure.”

Anne perked up, and at the mention of food, her stomach growled. She looked down, only then realizing that her stomach had been growing for quite some time now.

As her Dad left the room she decided that she should sort the rest of the books, then go downstairs to eat dinner. As soon as she finished sorting the rest of her fairy tales into their respective piles, Anne stood up, dusted herself off, and went downstairs so she could eat some food.

As Anne was eating her dinner, her Mom kept trying to start a conversation between the three of them, but she kept failing; the whole dinner was very awkward. The lasagna was good, and Anne savored the taste, scarfing it down. Once she finished the lasagna she quietly - or at least tried to - put away the dishes. Though due to the fact that she had a glass plate, metal silverware, and a glass cup, she wouldn’t say that the whole thing was quiet.

Once she put away all her dishes in the sink she walked her way around the table and, once she reached the bottom of the stairs, bolted up to her room. Her dinner was good, yes, but she wanted to find more about the six arm- wait. Wasn’t she trying to find out what she could nickname the “monster?” Anne was pretty sure that that was the case, so once she got into her room Anne got onto her bed - careful not to trip on any fairy tales from the two piles that she had formed - and started to ponder nicknames.

“The Six-Four?” No, that sounded like a police maneuver. Like, “Get down we got a Six Four!” So not that. Maybe she should look up something in Latin. She decided that yes, that would be a good idea, so she pulled out her laptop from its drawer (she rarely used it, so it spent most of its time in a drawer) and booted it up. Once Google was open she searched up “Latin for eyed” because she could recall that it had four eyes. The result came up, “luscus”. It was a good name but it didn’t fit. Anne sighed and tried to think of another term to describe the monster. Maybe “Six Arms?” She looked it up, and- nope. She wouldn’t use that either. So, as a last resort, Anne searched up, “Latin for Armed” and what came up was, “Armato” Yeah. That fit.

Once Anne figured out what she should call the monster, she wrote the name down on a piece of paper, put the paper on her bedside table, and closed the laptop. Once the laptop was turned off and put back into the drawer Anne sat back onto the bed and tried to memorize the name.

“Armato… Armato...Armato,” She muttered, trying to sound out the word. “Armato, Ar-ma-to” She frowned when the phrase didn’t sound quite right. She tried over and over again before giving up, never making the word sound quite right. Anne sighed, before deciding that she should get ready for bed, it had been a long day after all.  
As she was putting on her pajamas and going to the bathroom, Anne tried to figure out a solution to her situation, the situation, of course, being what was she going to do about the grove that she found in the forest? It was a really cool place, but she didn’t know what to about it. It wasn’t the most ideal place for a secret hide-a-away, it was in the middle of the forest past a field behind her house, so it wasn’t just a hop and a skip away, it was quite far away. So she really had no idea what to do about the grove with the purple leaves and the crystal clear water. She couldn’t just forget about the beautiful place so she was stuck.

Anne finished her routine and walked over to her parent’s room to say goodnight to them. She said goodnight to the both of them before she walked over to her room, ready to climb into bed and fall asleep, having vowed that she would deal with everything in the morning. But, on the way to her bed she tripped over her piles of books on the bedroom floor. She groaned in pain and glanced over to the pile to figure out which book she tripped over. She groaned once she found out that it was a particular bulky book; The Big Book of Fairy Tales. It was 500 pages long, a rarity when most books were around 20 pages, most of the books so much less than 500 pages. Though she supposed that that one was so bulky because it had many fairy tales in it. As Anne got up, she moved out of the way of the piles and she piled herself upon her bed, moving into a position that she could easily fall asleep in. As she got into her position she heard herself sigh as her vision blurred out.

As she woke up from dreamland, she looked up and out her window, the sudden onslaught of light assaulting her eyes, causing her to groan in pain. As the light hit her eyes Anne felt the warm morning air bristle her skin, giving her skin an aura of warmth. She sighed in contentment, her eyes closed and the warmth making her skin tingle. Once she opened her eyes again, the first thing that she did (after she whined about the light) was to check her alarm clock; as she had school that day, and needed to know if she needed to sprint out of bed to get ready or if she could marinate in bed for a few minutes longer. Or, at least until her parents called her to get ready.

The alarm clock that resided on her bedside table said that the time was only 7:12 am, so it was an odd 50 minutes before school started, so she knew that she could stay in bed a bit more, maybe figure out what she was going to do if she found anything about the Armato in her fairy tales. Anne stayed in her state of laying in bed for a few more minutes before she decided that yes, she needed to be a functioning human today. As she dragged herself out of bed she glanced at the clock once more, 7:32 am, the alarm clock showed, blinking every once and again. “Yikes,” she says, noting that she only had around 20 minutes to get ready, which the drive to school is around 15 minutes and all. “YIKES,” she says again, though this time it was quite a bit louder, it definitely wasn’t heard throughout the house, and it definitely didn’t cause her parents to share a look of amusement, both chuckling at her before they got back to doing whatever they were doing.

As Anne quickly got ready for school, she made sure to not trip on any books, as she didn’t want any bruises. Anne pulled on her clothes, and made downstairs, skipping two stairs at a time. Once she reached the bottom of the stairs, she hopped off them and made her way into the kitchen where her lunch was likely made. Which it wasn’t, which confused Anne, because her lunch was always made by her Mom and put there to take to school.

“Mom,” Anne called, wanting to find out where exactly her lunch was. “Where did you put my lunch?”

After a few seconds of waiting her Mom called back, “It’s a Saturday honey, no one is going to school!”

“Oh,” Anne muttered, ignoring the fact that she didn’t know what day it was and called back, “Thanks!”

As Anne moped, no doubt moping because of the whole debacle, she could vaguely hear her mother chuckling. Anne blushed and kicked off her shoes before dragging herself up the stairs and into her room.

Now that Anne knew that today was a Saturday, she had no idea what to do. She could sort through all her fairy tales in the piles, but that would take to long. And it would get boring really quick as well. She sighed, a long and sad noise, now only halfway up the stairs, purposely taking as long as she could to get up the stairs. Maybe she could try and figure out what exactly the function of a rubber duck is. Which might be a waste of time as well, but she might as well be doing something productive, not finding out about rubber ducks. Not that rubber ducks aren’t interesting, but she rather doing something with fairy tales than rubber ducks. She wasn’t even sure if she owned a rubber duck.

Anne pushed her thoughts back on track, which was quite a difficult task. She finished slowly climbing up the stairs and opened the door. Once Anne was in her room she plopped herself onto the floor, right next to where the piles of fairy tales where both making her room looking a lot messier then it usually looks. She sighed and looked up off of the floor trying to figure out which pile she landed next to, it was the pile of fairy tales that Anne thought would relate to the Armato.

Anne felt her face relax into a more peaceful expression, probably due to the fact that the pile was so small. She knew that it was so small because a six-armed four-eyed Armato is a very specific thing, she was not sure that the books in the pile even did relate to the Armato as her whole sorting system was based on memory. Anne pulled herself into a sitting position As she began to sort the books from most likely to least likely to contain anything about the Armato.

Once that was done Anne picked up the most likely book and got onto her bed, opened the book and dove in. After what seemed to be around 20 minutes of reading with no mention of an Armato, Anne put the book down and glared at the book, already frustrated with this whole endeavor. But, she picked it up and was about to start reading again when she suddenly had a revelation. She didn’t have to do this in person! The internet had all these fairy tales as well, so she could just read them on her laptop, and search for any four armed six-eyed beings.

Anne walked over to the drawer where the laptop was located and pulled it out, grumbling incomprehensible things to herself, though if you listened hard enough, you could probably find some curses peppered throughout her speech. Once the laptop was booted up and Coogle had a new tab open, she typed it the title of the fairy tale she was reading, Tales of the Monsters, and put pdf at the end, hoping to find a pdf of the book. As the results came up, Anne clicked on the one that seemed the most legit and started search the document for any mention of an Armato.

As there was no mention of an Armato in the fairy tale, which was kind of disappointing because she could’ve sworn that there was some mention of a monster like that in the book, but, it seemed like she was wrong. So, once Anne was done searching that book she grabbed the next likely book and searched it up and started the process again. After Anne was finished checking all the books but one, she was starting to lose hope. After all, she just searched through around 12 fairy tales trying to find anything that held even the faintest mention of an Armato. But, this all changed when Anne picked up the last fairy tale. The Timeline of King Arthur. It was a book that Anne used when she was lost in a King Arthur legend that she needed to bring out a timeline, she wasn’t sure why she did put this book in the pile, but she did. It just felt right. Once she searched the title and found a suitable pdf and searched for the creature she finally, finally, found a mention of the Armato.

“There is mention of a monster that Arthur and his band of knights fought that is mentioned to have six arms and it is sometimes mentioned to have four eyes….” Anne read aloud from the pdf. She almost couldn’t believe it. But this was exactly what she was looking for. It described the Armato, well she had to admit, very vaguely. But, Anne was sure that this had to be the Armato. Besides, didn’t the carving have knights in the picture as well? Those could very well be Arthur and his band of knights.

While the Timeline book didn’t have the most information on the Armato, it had enough information to know that it had been in the King Arthur legends, how Anne didn’t notice this before at all made her suspicious, Anne wasn’t going to question it at the moment. Now that Anne had finally found some information on the Armato she decided that she should reward herself or something. Positive reinforcement and all that. This in mind Anne glanced over to the clock on her laptop and was shocked to find that the time was 1:02, an hour after lunch.

Oh. Anne’s mind came to a screeching halt as she just now noticed that she was probably going to get told off for not eating anything. Oooh, That was bad. Anne cursed then put away her laptop as fast as she could and sped downstairs, reaching the kitchen in record time. Once she reached the kitchen she got out the supplies needed to make a sandwich. Grabbed a plate, and made a sandwich, no pickles of course. Those things are just disgusting. Though through this whole process Anne couldn’t seem to notice her Mom sitting at the table, watching her in amusement and barely concealed humor.

Anne finished making her sandwich and put it on a plate, hauling the plate over to the table, setting the sandwich down, and setting herself down. After all this Anne raised her sandwich to take a bite when she finally raised her eyes and met her Mother’s eyes. Anne froze, it was clear that she didn’t notice that her Mom was at the table, while her Mom took note of her presence when she walked into the room. After a few seconds of staring Anne slowly lowered the sandwich down and put it back onto her plate.  
“So,” Anne started, setting her hands in her lap. “This is awkward” Her mother snorted, unable to hold the humor of the situation in any longer, Anne cracked a smile and said, “So I’m not getting yelled at for eating this late?”

“Oh no,” Her mother reassured her, and at those words, Anne relaxed. “You still are going to get yelled at.” Mom finished. Anne tensed up again, not even trying to hide her frown.’

“Mooom,” Anne whined, not really wanting to get yelled at, but also wanting to finish her sandwich in peace.

“You know how it is honey, you’re supposed to eat at twelve! Not at one, or at two, or at anything else!”

Anne grumbled, having heard this lecture millions of times, mumbled the end of it in unison with her Mom, “And stop eating just sandwiches! I’m getting sick of it!”  
“Yes, yes, I’ve heard this over and over again Mom, now can I eat my sandwich in peace?”

Mom sighed, not willing to say that she was right, but willing to leave Anne alone. “Ok honey, just try to eat at a more reasonable time tomorrow, ok?”

“Yeah, yeah, ok, ok. I’ll try to eat at a more reasonable time tomorrow, ok?” Anne reasoned, taking a bite of the sandwich after she was done speaking.

Her Mom smiled brightly and said, “That’s all I can ask for honey. Thanks!” Then she muttered, “I really do wish that she would eat more. I mean, honestly.”

Anne looked at her Mom strangely before she got back to her sandwich, practically devouring the poor thing, this was probably due to the fact that Anne didn’t have any breakfast. Anne ate half of her sandwich and was so busy eating it that she didn’t notice her Mom leaving the room with a fond shake of her head.

After Anne finished with her sandwich she put away any dishes in the sink, then bounced upstairs, ready to concur the other pile of books in her room, the pile of books that held mention to a golden key. The same golden key that was in her jacket that was lying on her chair right now. Now that Anne was thinking about the golden key it didn’t seem to be able to escape her mind. She was thinking about each little swirl of gold on the handle and the single peg on the side, meant to open who knows what. With the end of the handle engraved with dozens little flowers (which she would later look up to find that they’re called, Gladiolus’, or ‘Sword Lily’, which she will admit is pretty cool) and the handle one big branch, it was a wonder to where this key could be put to open something. A hidden garden? A castle? A door, hidden on the side of a tree? A hidden realm? Whatever it was she looked forward to it, though she had no idea how she would find out what the key opens, she still allowed herself to daydream.

She entered her room and pulled out her laptop, ready to start the same process for the fairy tales in the pile for the golden key when she realized that she never put away the pile of books for the Armato. Anne sighed, and put the laptop back into its drawer then stood up, ready to put the books back onto the bookshelf. After that small task is done, Anne grabs the first book, and bounds over to her laptop to put the title in and start her search again. When, quite unexpectedly, she stops on her way to the laptop and is drawn towards the jacket that was haphazardly thrown over the edge of her desk chair. Anne, the book still in her hands, walks over to her jacket.

Each step was carefully measured, Anne’s gaze on the jacket became almost hypnotic, her eyes fixed on the maroon fabric, seemly measuring it up, taking in every feature of it in. She was approaching the jacket as if she had never seen it before, or anything like it. Once she was close enough to the jacket, she dropped the book, it only just nearly missing her foot. She pulled the jacket off of its perch on the chair and onto her shoulders. Letting it rest there for a few moments before reaching her hand into her pocket and pulling out the key. Once the key is in her hand she holds it up to a window and let the light catch it, the gold shining in the simple light of the sun, highlighting every twist and turn on the key. Every rose and every branch and every leaf. The key is a spectacular being in itself. Anne’s gaze on the key is fierce; it’s held for a long time, before she finally snapped back into herself and put the key back into her jacket pocket; not before she wrapped the key in a tissue, she didn’t want for it to get too dirty, although she found the key in a horse stall so it was probably a stupid decision to wrap the key in a tissue. Although, on her defense, it looked pretty delicate. 

Anne walked over to the spot where she had dropped the book, it is a miracle that it didn’t hit her toes or anything. She bent over to grab the book and headed back to her bed, where her laptop was, and put in the title for the book, and started the process again. This time the process took a bit longer, though she was sure that it was because the pile was bigger. The whole process took a few hours, she was sure of that fact, but she couldn’t help that she thought that time had gone a lot faster, maybe it was because Anne got so used to the process, that she just started to mindlessly do it? It was a possibility, and it was probably true; Anne had already done this with about 20 books for the Armato before she finally found the Timeline book. So, it made sense that she would’ve got good at doing it. Plus, it was kind of relaxing.

After she finished sorting through all the books, searching each one for a mention of a golden key. But, unfortunately, she doesn’t find any mention of a golden key that glows that also has gladiolus on it. Anne didn’t think that she would find any mention of the key, but it was still sort of disappointing when she didn’t find anything. So, once Anne was done with searching up all of the books, then trying to find any information about the keys, she put all the books back onto the bookshelf and scrambled back to her bed, where she closed all her tabs on those fairy tales and opened a new one. Then she searched up, “glowing golden key”, and waited for any results that would come up that she could use. After messing around with those search results for a while, and finding nothing, she tried to search up something else, to see if that search would garner any results. So, in turn, she searched up “golden gladiolus key” and searched every webpage to find anything that would even remotely have any information about a golden key covered with gladiolus and branches and, not surprisingly, finding nothing.

Anne sighs, not really surprised that she didn’t find anything, but disappointed to be proven wrong. Anne then checked the time on her laptop, half wanting to see what time it was, half wanting to see if it was close enough to family dinner time to go downstairs. Lucky, there was still a few more hours ‘till dinner, so she didn’t have to worry about that yet. But, now that she knew that it would be a few hours until dinner, she had no idea what to do for those few hours in between dinner and now, but Anne would figure it out.  
So what could she do? She could read - but that was getting kind of boring. She could mess around on the internet, which she really didn’t want to do. Speaking of which, she had to put away her laptop, if she wasn’t going to use it, there wasn’t really a reason for it to be out - where it could get damaged and potentially broken. Anne got up and started to put away the laptop when she nearly tripped over her own feet. She flushed, clearly embarrassed by this fact; even if no one could see her in her room. When she regained her dignity, she finished her task of putting away the laptop. Then she got back to pondering what she could do, it wasn’t easy finding something to do. In the end, she just decided to ask her dad if she could help with anything, though she wasn’t sure if her dad was doing anything that would even require any help at all, so she kind of in a pickle.

So, resigned as she was, headed out of her room and downstairs, hoping to locate her Dad as soon as possible. Anne headed down the stairs, skipping every other stair. As she landed on the floor, she almost fell, but she thankfully caught herself before she let herself fall. Once she regained her balance, she bounded off, ready to find her dad.

It wasn’t too much of a difficult task to find her father, he wasn’t off in the garage, nor was he in the basement, he was sitting at the kitchen table. Anne found her dad sitting at the kitchen table, sipping a cup of coffee, reading his newspaper. Anne was a bit confused on why he was reading a newspaper, way after breakfast. It was almost 4:30, and usually, the newspaper gets delivered early in the morning. Early in the morning. Anne stopped in the doorway, fully confused about her dad’s weird ways.

That’s when her dad looked up from wherever he was reading in the newspaper and said, “What’s up honey?”

“Urm, nothing's up. And that’s the problem?”

Her dad looked taken aback, clearly not understanding her or what she was saying. When he got his bearings back he cleared his throat and said, “What exactly do you mean?”  
Anne shifted in her spot and raised her hands up in a gesture that she usually made while talking, waving her hands around, although this time there were no words coming out of her mouth. After a few more seconds of this (trying to get words out, but, miraculously, failing) Anne finally gives up with a frustrated sigh, and says, “That’s kind of the problem. I have nothing to do!”

Her dad watches her, amused now that he solved the puzzle, and asks her, “Well, what do you want to do?”

“I don’t exactly know,” Anne admits, slumping down in acknowledgment that she doesn’t know what to do.

“You could go on a walk!” Her Dad suggests, bouncing in his chair with the suggestion. “Or you could always go on another ride!”

“Really?” Anne asks her Father, disappointed at the lame suggestions. “You want me to go on a ride? You know that I went on one yesterday right?”

“Well, yes, but it’s never a bad thing to go on a ride!”

“I guess, but where would I even go?”

Her Dad thinks for a moment before he finally says, “Go down the path that you went down yesterday. It’s plenty long and it should keep you occupied until dinner is done.”  
Anne sighed, clearly not acceptable to be sent down the trail again, but here we are. After she pouted for a few seconds she said, “Alright. I’ll go. But, if I get killed it’s your fault.”  
“Okay,” Her Dad chuckled, going back to his newspaper. After getting back to the spot he was on her called her and said, “Make sure you close the backdoor on the way out!”  
Anne smiled as she walked away from the kitchen and back upstairs, which she seemed to be doing a lot lately, and hopped her way up the stairs, determined to gather the supplies and go on another ride. The second one in two days. She entered her room and grabbed what she would need to take with her on the ride. Her jacket, an extra jacket in case it got really cold, a water bottle, and the golden key. She didn’t really need the golden key but she almost absentmindedly grabbed it, by the time that it was in her pocket, she forgot about it again. She told herself that she was going to grab a granola bar on the way out so that she could eat it before the ride. She didn’t want to get hungry. Before she left the room she changed her clothes into clothes that would be much more comfortable riding, so that she wouldn’t get bruises or weird marks on her after she was done. While she was changing she changed into a warmer shirt and left behind the extra jacket, it was just unneeded weight at that point. She hopped back down the stairs, armed with her jacket, water bottles, key, and riding clothes (that mostly consist of leggings and riding boots,) ready to take on the world!

She entered the kitchen, grabbed a granola bar, then decided that she wasn’t hungry enough to eat it now, stuffed it in her pocket, yelled goodbye to her parents, and headed out the backdoor, closing it behind her.

She began her walk to the horse stables, bouncing across the path, excited for another ride, even if it was only a few hours after the last one. As Anne reached the stables she pets both Daffodil and Rosebud before reaching Marigold’s stall. “Hey, Marigold!” Anne chimed, happy to see her horse and happy to see that Marigold was doing well. She murmured some praises to her horse before she opened the stall and lead her horse out of it.

As they trotted down the path Marigold kept nudging Anne’s face, excited to go wherever her owner was taking him. Anne and Marigold trotted down the path to the shed full of supplies for horse riding, and leave an indent of footprints in the dirt behind them.

It wasn’t too far of a walk to the shed, but it seems like Anne has walked Marigold there in a record amount of time, even though the shed is only a few feet from the collection of stalls. As the two arrive at the front of the shed, Anne pats Marigold’s neck and made her way into the shed, prepared to grab what she needed to put on Marigold so that she could take him on a ride.

After she finished setting up Marigold and getting everything else ready, Anne made sure that everything was fitting snugly on Marigold before she leads Marigold a far way past the shed and hopped on the horse, ready to ride… somewhere. She wasn’t too sure on where she wanted to ride to today, but she figured that she would just go wherever she needed to go. A couple minutes after she hopped on Marigold, she started to head to the field, that big wheat field that was right next to that forest. The forest which would really be a good place to ride to. Or, Anne could just ride there and check out her secret grove. Either option seemed like a good idea, so Anne stirred Marigold towards the general direction of the forest and let him take her there.

The trip across the field wasn’t as far as Anne remembered it to be, but the last time that she crossed this field Marigold froze up in a panic. Anne supposed that that would have contributed to the time, though she wasn’t sure how much of a difference it made. She didn’t know exactly how long the freak-out happened, so she wasn’t sure how long Marigold stopped for. Though, this wasn’t something that she should be worrying about right now, so Anne collected her thoughts and set out to cross the field, with Marigold of course.

As the two trotted across the field - well, it was Marigold who was doing all the trotting - Anne just rode him. As the two reached the forest entrance, Anne took a few breaths before she let Marigold walk into the forest. Doing this calmed her nerves a bit, as she wanted to see her grove again, but she was nervous that the grove would somehow be gone, that it had somehow disappeared. Anne knew that it was an unreasonable fear, but she wanted to see the grove again and soon. So, Anne tried to keep her nerves at bay, and mostly succeeded, but the nerves were definitely still there. Despite this, Anne and Marigold entered the forest, Anne almost frigid with nervousness, while Marigold just carried on trotting down the path, seemingly having no care in the world. 

The forest was the same as it always was, a path lined with trees and flowers and bushes. A sky that was hidden by the leaves of the trees. A brown dirt and gravel path that Marigold and she had ridden down so many times by now, all these things were constant, and it was a relief to Anne that they were all here. Glad to see some normalcy in her panic-filled state, Anne let out a huff of happiness, and let a small smile grace her face. Almost absentmindedly, Anne reached into her jacket pocket and gripped the key, the other had on Marigold’s rains. Anne found that this action calmed her down quite a bit, so she kept her hold on the key, letting herself relax because of that. Once Anne adjusted to string Marigold with only one hand, (though it wasn’t needed that much, Marigold and Anne have gone down this one path so many times that Marigold has probably memorized the path by now, Anne certainly had.) She let Marigold set her own pace, not really caring how fast they were going, a stark contrast to yesterday, where she was going very fast and it seemed like she would never want to stop. 

As it turned out, Marigold’s own pace was nice and calm, it wasn’t frantically rushing down a path, but it also wasn’t snail's pace, so Anne found that she quite liked this pace, especially when she wanted to be left alone to her thoughts. As Anne found that this was a nice pace to ride at, she took her hand out of the pocket that it was in and she petted Marigold’s neck, silently congratulating her on setting a good pace, and returned her hand to her pocket, now gripping the key lighter. It wasn’t so much of a death grip that she had on it earlier, but it was still pretty tight. Maybe it was due to the fact that she didn’t want to lose the key and let it fall out of her pocket, maybe it was due to the fact that all her nerves haven’t gone completely away, or maybe it was a mixture of both things, but Anne wasn’t all too sure. But she also didn’t care enough to investigate it further, especially when her mind had finally reached a black state, letting Anne relax for a minute. It was nice if a bit weird, not having her brain fly at her with new thoughts and weird conclusions that seemingly come out of nowhere. While it normally didn’t bother her, it was nice to feel numb for a bit.

As Marigold kept up her pace, Anne realized that going down this path would probably take a while if they kept up the pace. Anne didn’t have a problem with that, but it was almost tantalizingly slow compared to how fast she could go down the path. Anne knew full well that just normally going down the path at a not slow but also not ridiculously fast pace, you could probably get the path done in maybe an hour, but Anne had no idea how long it would take her to get to the grove. If Anne remembered correctly, the grove was almost half-way down the path, so that meant that it would take around half-an-hour to get there when she was riding normally. And right now, Anne was riding at maybe half that speed, so she estimated that it might take from around 45 minutes to 50 minutes to get there from the entrance. But, the two had already been riding for a bit by the time that Anne had come to this conclusion, so the answer could vary from taking 10 minutes off, to taking 5 minutes off the estimate. So Anne had no idea how long it was going to take her to get there and the only answer that she had was a very rough estimate, so Anne wasn’t set in stone about anything. But Anne wasn’t going to budge on the fact that she’d given Marigold her own pace to walk at, and that pace it would stay. So while Anne might be contemplating how many minutes it would take for Anne and Marigold to get to the grove, Anne didn’t have any intention of letting the horse go at anything but her own pace, so all Anne was really doing was creating mindless chatter for herself, give her brain a little activity worksheet to get back to working already.

This kept Anne busy for the whole slow, slow, process of getting to the grove, letting her mind wander off in weird places and coming up with ridiculous conclusions to these questions. But really though, what country would eat bear meat? By the time that Anne had reached the entrance to the grove her mind had almost been worn out, but at most the side effects seemed to be that she was a bit sluggish, but she was okay. Anne couldn’t not say that the entrance to the grove had changed, but saying that there was suddenly an archway for an entrance was a bit of a give-a-way, but the archway was cool, and it had flowers and vines on it as well, reminding Anne of that key that held so much of her fascination. But, at this point, Anne didn’t want to find out why the two were so similar, she just wanted to see the grove and see the grove she did.

Anne lets out a gasp, amazed by the fact that despite that fact that she had only been gone for a day or so the whole grove had somehow become more gorgeous, more brilliant, more magnificent. It was like overnight the whole grove became much more magical, Anne was so amused by this new development that she let out a gasp, her mouth dropping and her eyes becoming stars. Last time, when she thought the place looked like a fairy tail, Anne knew that she was dead wrong the last time she thought that. This had to be apart of a fairy tail, and she knew that this would be one of the most beautiful sights that she would see in her whole life.

Somehow the beautiful crystal clear water waterfall that she saw last time had become even more pretty, with the lake being filled with koi fish - that was a new development too. The waterfall ran into a lake. Last time there had been just a small pond. The grass that coated the floor was a grass that was so green that Anne felt like it was fake. And when Anne looked up at the trees? “Wow,” was the only thing that came out of her mouth, and even then the whispered wow merely slipped out of her mouth on accident. Anne surely had no idea that the word had even slipped out. The reason that Anne took to saying “Wow,” and the implications that she didn’t know that she said it was that somehow the pastel purple leaves on the trees had now become a royal purple, one of Anne’s favorite colors.

The whole grove kept Anne in a state of shock, which was funny considering this was the same reaction that Anne had the first time that she saw the grove, but Anne wasn’t saying anything about the similarities. It was then when Anne saw the cave again, the cave that had the carvings, the cave that originally led her to the Armato. Anne felt her face freeze up again when she looked at the cave, which, admittedly, had not changed that much from the last time that Anne saw it, but Anne could say in full confidence that it was overgrown.

At this moment Anne’s feet guided her to the cave, her fingers tightening around the key, and the cave was as big as it ever was, with its giant vines (plus a whole bunch of new plants too - Anne would have to look those up later) and everything. Once she got to the cave she stopped in the entrance for a few moments staring at everything, taking in the whole cave in her eyes. 

When she was surveying the cave Anne’s eyes caught on what had to be, had to be, the caving in the wall. Anne stepped forward, toward the knights and the Armato and the carving. After a few steps more, Anne was facing the carving right in the face staring at it for a few seconds before she brought her fingers up to the carving - the ones that weren’t occupied with the key- and traced the carving, her mouth whispering “Armato,” her lips curling at the word. And, since she had tried to pronounce it out loud, it didn’t sound wrong, no, it sounded right. With an almost practiced motion, Anne pulled out the key from her pocket and held it up to the carving, the two shining brightly from being near each other. It was then that Anne put the key in a hole that was… somewhere on the carving, and twisted it, flinching back when she realized what she did. But, she couldn’t stop what Anne just did, as the wall made a rumbling noise and split in half, down the middle of the carving, opening a door… and a tunnel.

Anne could swear that she almost felt her heart stop with a force that even startled her, Anne had never, never seen anything like this, and somehow, Anne couldn’t look away. The bright light that was coming out of the tunnel that she opened was almost blinding, but somehow, it wasn’t. With a few experimental steps towards the tunnel - towards the light - Anne was almost addicted to it, which you really couldn’t blame her for that, the light was very intoxicating, it was like watching a moth find its way to a beacon. Like a starving man eating his first bite of food in a decade. And with that final thought, Anne stepped her way into the shining light and felt herself being transported. And soon, she couldn’t see the bright white light the only thing that she could see were…. hills. Big, green hills.

**Author's Note:**

> If anyone finds this and wants me to continue it, let me know. Even if it's one person who likes it, I'll probably add a chapter or two. I hope I don't sound too needy, but this was a school assignment I'm (kind of) proud of, so I want to know if others want me to continue it or not. Nobody should feel obliged to leave feedback though, I just want to know if anyone (and I mean anyone) wants me to continue it. I hope you have a nice day! <3
> 
> Also thanks to everyone who has read this, whether you just read a paragraph or the whole thing. <3


End file.
